How to make a magical cup of tea – Part Three

Clara had never seen anything like the mountain the broom now landed upon. Everything about it was dreamlike; everything seemed to glow with a bright, hazy light and the river that flowed nearby
seemed to make a tinkling sound like little bells and, tweeting in the trees, all the birds had feathers of gold or silver or bronze and eyes like jewels or glass marbles and then, after she and the witch had gotten off of the broom, the old woman took her by the hand and led her into a forest where all the trees were covered in brightly glowing blossoms of all the colours of the rainbow.

“This is the fire blossom forest where Dragon roots grow”, she said to Clara, “Have a look around and see if you can see one, they usually make a sort of croaking sound, like a frog and they have big flapping wings”.

“Wings? Flapping wings?”, asked Clara, surprised, “On a plant?”.

The Witch nodded, “Well, I call them wings but they’re more like big leaves really. The dragon root is a flying plant,you see. It hatches out of a green egg too, planted in the clouds,instead of growing from a seed”.

But, just then, Clara thought she saw something fluttering about amidst some odd looking trees
covered in glowing fruit shaped like paper lanterns and then, suddenly, flapping towards her came one of the peculiar dragon roots and, circling her head three times it came to rest upon her shoulder, opening its rose like petals wide before making, just as the Witch had said, a funny sort of croaking sound.

“It’s really quite pretty, if very peculiar”, said Clara, sniffing the plant to see if it had a fragrance.

The Puppy in her arms thought the flapping plant very peculiar too, so much so that it started barking at it and, startled, the Dragon root almost flew away but, before it could take to the air again, Madame Wu reached out quickly and snatched hold of it, stuffing it, wriggling, into her hat.

“At last”, said the Witch, licking her lips, “I can almost taste that magical tea”.

But, just then, both Clara and the Witch heard a voice like thunder echo throughout the forest; a voice so loud that, like a strong wind, it made trees bend over.

“Who dares to enter my wizardom and steal my dragon root?”, it said.

And, suddenly, in front of them appeared a wizard in flowing, blue satin robes with a long white beard and moustache that went all the way down to his golden sandaled feet.

“I am Xu, the mightiest Wizard of all and this is my mountain and my forest”, he said and picking up a heavy boulder from the forest floor with one hand, he held it over his head boasting, “Look at how strong I am. The heaviest thing is light to me”.

But Madame Wu only smiled, “I know that old trick well. The spell that makes all heavy things light”.

And then, reaching into her hat and taking out a single white feather, she blew the feather towards him and, as soon as the feather touched him it knocked him to the ground with the force of a heavy lead cannon ball.

“The same spell”, she added, ”Makes all light things heavy”.

However, then the Wizard with the long beard disappeared and, instead of a voice like thunder, Clara now felt thunder trembling under the soles of her feet and quickly the trembling turned
to a shaking and then to a quaking as, in the distance, she saw a cloud of dust and heard the noise of a thousand stampeding hooves.

“Sounds like unicorns”, said Madame Wu with a troubled look upon her old face, lifting up Clara and seating her once again upon the back of her broom, “We must fly quickly”.

“Unicorns?”, asked Clara, confused, “But aren’t Unicorns supposed to be nice animals?”.

“Not these ones”, replied the Witch climbing onto the front of her broom, “These ones are the Wizard Xu in another form and he seems angry”.

And then, shaking as much as the earth, but with fear, Clara saw a stampeding heard of a thousand jet black unicorns; each with a long silver horn upon its head; flames pouring from their mouths and flared nostrils and a wild look of anger within their eyes.

Fortunately, just at that moment, Madame Wu made her broom rise up into the air and, turning around,soar swiftly out of the fire blossom forest and towards the setting sun.

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When they reached the house of Madame Wu, which Clara saw was like a towering golden Chinese pagoda, the little girl was very tired and really just wanted to go home but Madame Wu insisted that first she try some of her amazing tea and, placing the dragon root and some other odd looking ingredients into her magic golden teapot, she put a lid on the teapot and, rubbing it just like a genies lamp, said to something inside it, "Demon make a magical cup of tea for us to drink", explaining to Clara, "Demons make the best cups of tea, they're quite delicious" and, suddenly, Clara saw the teapot light up and glow as brightly as a star; then, putting a teacup down in front of Clara, she filled it with a peculiar rainbow coloured liquid to which she added milk, which she claimed was the milk of unicorns and two spoons of sugar which she said was fairy dust.

Lifting the cup to her lips, Clara took a sip and was astounded by what she tasted; like a whirling kaleidoscope of flavours in her mouth; there was every kind of fruit flavour in it, not to mention chocolate and toffee and licquorice and mint flavour aswell and then, to her amazement, Clara started to feel a very strong tingly sensation in her toes which began working its way quickly through her whole body.

“What’s that funny feeling?”, asked Clara, giggling.

“That’s the dragon root”, said Madame Wu, smiling, “Just wait. You have not seen the best part yet”.

Then, looking down at her feet, Clara saw that they had transformed completely into a jet of brightly coloured flame, infact her whole body was starting to change; turning into an enormous firework which then, with a whoosh, went whizzing round about the room.

“Wait! Wait!”, cried Madame Wu, “Let me open the window first!”.

And, saying this, Madame Wu clicked her finger and thumb together and the window of her kitchen opened wide and the firework that was Clara went whizzing out of the window and up to the sky,
exploding into a shower of bright multi-coloured stars that could be seen for miles around.

“Wow!”, said Clara whizzing back in through the kitchen window and floating down into her chair, her body returning to its original form, “That really is a magical cup of tea”.